Original articleDoes Online Harassment Constitute Bullying? An Exploration of Online Harassment by Known Peers and Online-Only Contacts
Section snippets
Prevalence and characteristics of online harassment
Researchers have not devised standard definitions of online harassment, and the few surveys that exist have used different definitions and time frames, finding widely varying rates. For example, a study published in 2006 conducted with an online convenience sample found that 29% of youth had ever been bullied online, with online bullying defined to include “bothering someone online, teasing in a mean way, calling someone hurtful names, intentionally leaving persons out of things, threatening
Does online harassment constitute bullying?
Much bullying occurs in school [5], [9], but how often online harassment arises from incidents at school is unknown. As noted, much online harassment is perpetrated by online contacts that youth do not know in person. Online harassment precludes physical acts of violence, and it may be less threatening because harassers cannot use physical attributes such as size and tone of voice to intimidate. On the other hand, verbal aggression in the form of threats, rumors, and gossip is a form of
Methods
We used telephone interviews conducted between March and June 2005 to gather information from a national sample of youth Internet users. The research was approved by the University of New Hampshire Institutional Review Board.
Results
Nine percent (n = 129) of the 1499 youth respondents had been harassed online in the past year. Of these, 43% (n = 56) were harassed by known peers and 57% (n = 73) by online-only contacts.
Does online harassment constitute bullying?
Certain individual variables suggest that online harassment by known peers may constitute bullying more often than harassment by online-only contacts, defining bullying as requiring aggression, repetition, and power imbalance. More than half of known peer harassers sent or posted messages for others to see, suggesting gossip and rumor spreading and incidents that would be difficult for targets to terminate. Also, close to half of known peer harassers were female. Because girls who bully tend to
Acknowledgments
All of the funds for this research were derived from federal sources, totaling $348,767, through Grant No. 2005-MC-CX-K024 from the U.S. Department of Justice, OJJDP, and Grant No. HSCEOP-05-P-00346 from the U.S. Secret Service, Department of Homeland Security. Points of view or opinions in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice or Department of Homeland Security. Program support was provided by
References (20)
- et al.
The juvenile victimization questionnaire: reliability, validity and national norms
Child Abuse Neglect
(2005) - et al.
Online Victimization: 5 Years Later
(2006) - et al.
Bullies move beyond the schoolyard: a preliminary look at cyberbullying
Youth Violence Juvenile Justice
(2006) Cyberbullying
Trends Tudes
(2007)- et al.
Online Victimization: A Report on the Nation’s Youth
(2000) - et al.
Bullying behaviors among US youth: prevalence and association with psychosocial adjustment
JAMA
(2001) - et al.
Risk and impact of internet harassment: findings from the second Youth Internet Safety Survey
Pediatrics
(2006) Update on bullying at school: science forgotten?
Dev Rev
(2007)- et al.
Definitions of bullying: a comparison of terms used, and age and gender differences in a fourteen country international comparison
Child Dev
(2002) - et al.
Research on school bullying and victimization: what have we learned and where do we go from here?
School Psychol Rev
(2003)
Cited by (328)
Cyberbullying in Sport
2023, International Journal of Sport CommunicationDangerous misogyny of the digital world: The case of the manosphere
2023, The Digital Global ConditionAdolescent Cyberbullies’ Attributions: Longitudinal Linkages to Cyberbullying Perpetration
2023, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public HealthThe role of metacognitions in cyberbullying and cybervictimization among adolescents diagnosed with major depressive disorder and anxiety disorders: A case–control study
2023, Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy